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L'avventura (The Adventure) is a 1960 Italian film written and directed by Michelangelo Antonioni. Monica Vitti and Gabriele Ferzetti star. The film is notable for its slow pacing and careful composition, and for its unusual narrative structure. It was produced on location in Italy under difficult financial and physical conditions and made Monica Vitti an international star. The film is the first of a trilogy by Antonioni; it is followed by La notte and L'eclisse.

Synopsis

L'avventura has an unusual narrative structure in which the apparently important central mystery is gradually forgotten and left unsolved. The story begins with a group of rich couples from Rome who take a boat trip and visit a virtually unpopulated volcanic island off the coast of Sicily. One of them, a young woman named Anna, wanders off and vanishes without a trace. The others search for her, but then give up, gradually adjust to her disappearance and drift back into their own lives. The rest of the story is somewhat centered on the relationship that develops between Anna's lover and her best friend. The final scene has nothing directly to do with Anna (except perhaps for the thought that her fate is unknowable) but much with how people cope with themselves and each other.

Cast

Actor	Role
Gabriele Ferzetti	Sandro
Monica Vitti	Claudia
Lea Massari	Anna
Dominique Blanchar	Giulia
Renzo Ricci	Anna's Father
Dorothy de Poliolo	Gloria Perkins
Esmeralda Ruspoli	Patrizia
James Addams	Corrado
Lelio Luttazzi	Raimondo
Giovanni Petrucci	Young Prince
Jack O'Connell	Old man on the island
Angela Tomasi di Lampedusa	The Princess

Responses

Released in 1960, the film was booed by some members of the audience during its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival; however, it won the Prix le Premier Regard. Although the film influenced the visual language of cinema, forever changing how subsequent movies looked, and has been named by some critics as one of the best ever made, it has been criticized by others for its uneventful plot, allegedly slow pacing and existentialist themes. Along with much of Antonioni's other work, L'avventura is often cited as an early feminist film with strong and richly characterized female protagonists.